Shane Buettner

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Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Naked Lunch
Shane Buettner  |  Aug 20, 2014  |  0 comments
Well, now that I’m Seeing It, What Is It?

Picture
Sound
Extras
Interactivity
Writer/Director David Cronenberg translated William S. Burroughs’ “unfilmable” book Naked Lunch in a (ahem) novel way, creating an intensely hallucinogenic, psychosexual trip that’s more about the writer himself than the writer’s cultural lightning rod of a book. Cronenberg incorporates bits of the book, but infuses his film with a profound statement on the artistic process, and especially the inner turmoil that fuels many artists’ best work. Cronenberg’s movie sees Naked Lunch the novel through Burroughs’ shame and torment over being a homosexual and his consuming drug addiction. Other aspects of the author’s life are also interwoven into the film’s narrative with the most notorious being that he was married to a woman, Joan, who Burroughs shot and killed during an intoxicated “William Tell Routine.”
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Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Nashville
Shane Buettner  |  Mar 21, 2014  |  0 comments
Picture
Sound
Extras
Interactivity
Rebel director Robert Altman was buried and resurrected countless times in his long career, beating the system and making vital films right up to his death in 2006. 1975’s Nashville was his high-water mark, a great film and the zenith of his 1970s glory years. A musical, a political drama, a romantic drama, a country music mockumentary, and a tragedy, Nashville defies description as a story.
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New Blu From Samsung
Shane Buettner  |  Jan 07, 2008  |  0 comments
Now, this is the rather fascinating thing about our industry. We love awards so much, we hand out "innovation" awards long before the products actually ship. Thus, I can tell you that while Samsung has just started shipping its "award winning" BD-UP5000 DuoHD dual format player, it has just announced its second generation combi, the BD-UP5500, for release in the second half of 2008! I am not in marketing so I have no idea how it goes selling a player whose successor is already announced before it hits the streets, but there you go.
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Next-Gen HD DVD From Toshiba For 2006
Shane Buettner  |  Sep 14, 2006  |  9 comments

Toshiba fired another salvo in the ongoing next-gen HD disc format war by announcing that it will have its second-generation HD DVD players to market by the end of 2006.
The $499 HD-A2 will street in October, with the step-up $999 HD-XA2 following in December.

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Next-Gen Interactivity: U-Control on Universal's Children of Men HD DVD.
Shane Buettner  |  Apr 20, 2007  |  2 comments

We focus on picture and sound here at <I>UAV</I> more often than not, but enhanced interactivity is regarded as a major selling feature of the next-gen formats. And this is unequivocally where HD DVD is a mile ahead of Blu-ray, in spite of the latter's hype machine in favor of Java's superiority in this regard. Blu-ray might eventually catch HD DVD in interactivity, but at this point there isn't a single Blu-ray player in the market that has been verified to me as being spec'd to support the kind of Picture-In-Picture driven features you can find on a lot of HD DVDs in stores now. And these features can be accessed in full on every HD DVD player out there except LG's Multi-Blue.

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Blu-ray Movie Reviews
Night At the Museum (Blu-ray)
Shane Buettner  |  Apr 14, 2007  |  0 comments

What a fun surprise this turned out to be! <I>Night at the Museum</I> stars Ben Stiller as Larry, a wannabe entreprenuer who just can't make it happen for himself. His ex-wife is remarried, and Larry's son Nick now wants to be a straight business man like his step-Dad. Seeking to impress Nick that he's a reliable Dad, Larry grabs a job as the night watchman at the Museum of Natural History. There's something immediately off about the orientation given to Larry by the outgoing trio of watchmen (led by Dick Van Dyke in an inspired turn), not to mention the oddly thick packet of hand written job instructions they hand him.

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Niveus Media To Ship HD DVD Compatible Media Servers
Shane Buettner  |  Sep 15, 2006  |  0 comments

Silicon Valley based Niveus Media made compelling announcements of its new media servers, which are based on Microsoft’s Windows XP Media Center platform and also use Intel’s Viiv technology. While digital photos and music are on tap, as with many media servers, what will separate Niveus’ machines is the ability to handle HD DVD and other high-definition content.

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No SATA For This Comcast Monkey
Shane Buettner  |  Apr 14, 2007  |  7 comments

According to Comcast, the SATA port on the back of my Motorola DTC3416 set-top box/DVR isn't yet active and there are no promises on when, or even if it will be activated. I have to admit I'm halfway considering testing this out for myself to make sure the info I got from Comcast is correct. I had a 500GB drive with a sleek case picked out already, and the entire rig would only cost about $170.

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Not Every Demo Is A Rave
Shane Buettner  |  Sep 07, 2007  |  1 comments

There are trade show days that feature one knock out demo after another, but believe me- not all of them come up roses. We have so much to write about, and trade show demos present so many unknowns and variables that I'm not very quick to criticize based on what I see here let alone to take the time to write about it.

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Nothing To Photograph Here, Move Along Please.
Shane Buettner  |  Jan 09, 2007  |  6 comments

I couldn't help myself with this one. As mentioned previously, Samsung amazed us by parking these "No Photos" signs all over its booth at CES. For all appearances, someone didn't want us taking pictures and talking up Samsung's new gear. Why show the stuff then?

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